Uber Shuts Down App that Told Drivers if Uber Underpaid Them

upstart writes in with an IRC submission for Runaway1956:

Uber Shuts Down App That Told Drivers If Uber Underpaid Them:

The creator of the Chrome extension 'UberCheats' Armin Samii said Uber claimed it violated its trademark. "Uber filed a false trademark claim against UberCheats, so it's been taken off the Chrome app store," he said on Twitter. "They claim that people might confuse it for an actual Uber product."

UberCheats was a Chrome extension that helped drivers figure out if they'd been underpaid by for Uber.

[...] Samii's app helped keep Uber accountable, kept drivers informed, and was incredibly simple. "Sometimes Uber calculates the distance from point A to point B incorrectly," he told Motherboard in an email. "My guess is that they use the 'straight line' distance rather than the actual distance traveled. In my area, that has led to a '6 minute trip' taking 50 minutes, since they thought I could...fly, I guess? Technically, the app is quite simple. It looks at the start/end destination of the trip, plugs it into google maps, and checks to see if the distance you were paid for matches the distance Google says."

[...] Samii launched his Chrome extension in August 2020 and hadn't had any problems keeping it online until now.

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